Liebster Award #? Who's Counting, Right?

Quiggy at The Midnite Drive-In nominated me for the Liebster Award.  Thank you, Quiggy!  I'm sorry it took me several weeks to finally post this.

Of course, for the Liebster, you're supposed to answer 11 questions from the person who gave you the award, then make up 11 new questions and tag 11 people, etc.  Here are my answers to Quiggy's questions:

1. What is your favorite genre of movie?  Westerns!  They are my happy place :-)

2. And what movie do you consider to be the paragon of that genre?  The Magnificent Seven (1960)

3. With which actor or actress, living or dead, would you most like to have a one-on-one (strictly platonic) dinner and conversation date?  At the moment, Alan Ladd, obviously.  I want to hug him (hugs can be platonic!) and reassure him he's a good actor and will not be forgotten.

4. If you were an actor or actress, which movie character would you most like to have played?  How to choose?  Oh, I'll just say I'd love to have played Maureen O'Hara's role opposite John Wayne in The Quiet Man (1952).

5. What is your favorite movie opening sequence, and, on the other side of the coin what is your favorite movie ending?  I love the way The Man from U.N.C.L.E. (2015) opens, with Cold War headlines and retro opening titles giving way to grainy '60s-style footage of East Berlin that pans over the city and focuses in on Napoleon Solo (Henry Cavill).  It's such a downright groovy way to kick the film off.

As for a favorite movie ending, um... I love a lot of movie endings.  Okay, just to pick one, I love how Gunfight in Abilene (1967) ends very similarly to High Noon (1952), with the sheriff having dispatched the bad guy, standing in the empty street with his love interest at his side -- only in Abilene, he doesn't drop his tin star in the dirt, he's proud to be the sheriff.  It's a nice nod to the earlier film, while ending quite differently.

6. Which movie was the worst remake ever, and which one was the best?  There are a lot of bad remakes out there, and I'm not sure I can (or want to) choose a worst.  Sabrina (1995) is the best remake I have ever seen.  The original lacks chemistry, humor, and charm, but the remake has all of those in spades.

7. If you were a director, which movie would you like to direct? It can be one that hasn't been made yet or it could be a classic in which you replaced the actual director.  I want to write, direct, cast, and produce a movie version of The Blue Castle by L. M. Montgomery.  I would cast Michael Fassbender as Barney Snaith, and I think maybe Elizabeth Henstridge as Valancy Stirling.

8. On average, how many new movies ("new" to you, not necessarily new theatrical releases) do you watch in a month?  Two or three, usually.  More in the summer, when I go to the theater more often.  But I only watch four or five movies at home most months, and often it's less than that, so yeah... not a ton.  That's why my TBW pile grows instead of shrinking.

9. List at least one actor, actress or director you thought SHOULD have been given the Oscar as opposed to the one who did. Specify which movie they should have gotten said Oscar.  I've always been horribly upset that Harrison Ford did not with the Best Actor award for Witness in 1985.

10. Which movie has the best dialogue (meaning most eminently quotable)?  I quote so many movies!  So Very Many.  I'll just go with The Avengers (2012) on this one, cuz Joss Whedon writes the best dialog ever ever ever ever, and that's one of the movies I quote most.

11.Which of your movie blog posts is the one of which you are most proud?  Probably my totally made-up review of the fake film noir version of Hamlet, Murder Most Foul.  It was soooooo much fun to imagine up, find photos for, and write.  I just wish it really existed!

(You KNEW I'd slip a photo of Ladd in here somewhere, right?)

Okay, I'm also supposed to list 11 facts about myself that I think are interesting.  It's hard coming up with new facts all the time, so I'm sorry if I repeat some I've used previously.

1.  I named my first dog "Spunky" after a book by Janette Oke.
2.  I named my second dog "Lucas" after the main character on the show The Rifleman.
3.  I named my third dog "Westley" after the main character in The Princess Bride.
4.  I like listening to vinyl records.
5.  I went to the Summer Olympics in Atlanta, GA, in 1996.
6.  I collect Coca-Cola merchandise and decorated my kitchen with some of it.
7.  My MBTI type is ISFJ.
8.  I love Wolverine more than Thor.  (Try not to faint.)
9.  I've eaten bear, moose, and elk.
10.  I love playing with Legos.
11.  My middle name and my daughters' middle names all end with an 'e'.

I hope those were interesting.  Now to tag 11 bloggers!

Captured by the Word (Eowyn)
Classic Film Observations and Obsessions (Jocelyn)
Classic Forever (Millie)
A Free Mind (SW)
A Girl's Place (Rachel)
J and J Productions 1809 (James)
An Old-Fashioned Girl (Rose)
Phyllis Loves Classic Movies (Phyl)
Preppies of the Apocalypse (Morgan)
Silents and Talkies (Kate Gabrielle)
Sunshiny Corner (Miss March)

Play if you want to!

Here are the 11 questions I want YOU to answer:

1.  Is there a movie that has really yummy-looking food in it that you'd love to eat?
2.  What era do most of your favorite movies take place in?
3.  What two actors/actresses have you always hoped would make a movie together, but didn't/haven't yet?
4.  If money and time and supplies (and crafting ability) were not considerations, what movie character would you love to cosplay or dress up like for Halloween?
5.  Have you ever cosplayed or dressed up like a movie or TV character for Halloween?
6.  What movie would your friends/family be surprised to learn you truly enjoyed?
7.  What's one book you hope no one ever makes into a film?
8.  Do you know the Wilhelm Scream when you hear it?
9.  When a character onscreen has to hold their breath, to you try to hold your breath to match theirs?
10.  What upcoming movies (or TV series) are you excited about?
11.  What are some of your favorite movie-oriented blogs?  (Or just blogs that post movie reviews sometimes.)

If I didn't tag you, but you want to answer these questions anyway, feel free to do so in the comments.  Or on your own blog -- you can ask me for an "official" tag if you want to :-)

20 Things You Might Not Know About Me

Kara from Flowers of Quiet Happiness has tagged me in this list thingie that's been going around the blogosphere lately.  Here are my answers!

Question 1: How tall are you?  5'7"

Question 2: Do you have a hidden talent? If so, what?  I'm very, very good at keeping secrets.

Question 3: What’s your biggest blog-related pet peeve?  I actually refuse to follow any blog that does not provide a way for me to navigate their old posts.  If there's no "labels" or "archive" section anywhere, I can't see if you've ever written about anything else that might interest me.  And I don't have time to hit "previous post" over and over and over.

Question 4: What’s your biggest non-blog related pet peeve?  Cereal bags that are hard to open.

Question 5: What’s your favorite song?  "Mack the Knife," any version sung by Bobby Darin.

Question 6: What’s your favorite Etsy shop that isn’t yours?  I've bought more things from The Ring and the Lion than any other store.  The owner has made me a lot of custom LOTR-related items, and I've also randomly bought things she's made that have struck my fancy.

Question 7: What’s your favorite way to spend your free time when you’re alone?  Not being interrupted.  It's a rare privilege.

Question 8: What’s your favorite junk food?  Cheetos and Oreos.  Not at the same time, though.

Question 9: Do you have a pet or pets? If so, what kind and what are their names?  We currently have a purple Betta fish named Winter.

Question 10: What are your number one favorite nonfiction and fiction books?  Nonfiction would be the Bible.  Fiction would be Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte.

Question 11: What’s your favorite beauty product?  Pantene conditioner.

Question 12: When were you last embarrassed? What happened?  I felt mildly embarrassed on Sunday when I started explaining the craft to all the moms and little kids in Sunday school, and no one paid any attention because I was talking too quietly.

Question 13: If you could only drink one beverage (besides water) for the rest of your life, what would it be?  Coca-cola.

Question 14: What’s your favorite movie?  The Man from Snowy River.

Question 15: What were you in high school: prom queen, nerd, cheerleader, jock, valedictorian, band geek, loner, artist, prep?  I was homeschooled K-12, but in college, I was in the writerly group, on the fringe of the theatre group, and friends with lots of the artists.  Nerdly, vehemently non-preppy, unarguably non-jock.

Question 16: If you could live anywhere in the world, where would you live?  I love my house, so here is good.

Question 17: PC or Mac?  PC.

Question 18: Last romantic gesture from a crush, date, boy/girlfriend, spouse?  My husband kissed me on the nose when I said good night to him.  He has a cold, so he went to bed early, and also kissed my nose instead of my lips so he wouldn't spread germs.  Even though I had the cold already.

Question 19: Favorite celebrity?  Hugh Jackman.  He reminds me a lot of myself, actually.

Question 20: What blogger do you secretly want be best friends with?  If by that you mean, "What blogger(s) would you like to meet in real life because you think you could be real life friends too," then Kara and Heidi :-)  EDIT:  And Joanna!  How did I forget Joanna?  Oops!  Let's blame it on Hugh Jackman distracting me with his kind smile.


I'm not tagging anyone because it's late and I'm tired, and I have miles to go before I sleep.  Well, miles of things to do, anyway.  If you want to play, here's the rules and regulations:

1. Copy and paste the questions below and then answer and turn them into a blog post. Or, record a video answering these questions and upload it to your blog post.

 2. At the bottom of your post, tag anywhere from 2-10 bloggers you want to see answer these questions. (I also suggest hitting up your tagged people via social media just to let them know you tagged them to do this tag challenge.)

3. Use the title: 20 Things You Might Not Know About Me Blog Tag. Once you’ve hit publish, leave a comment below with the link to your post.

 4. Use the hashtag #20ThingsBlogTag when sharing on social media so we can all find your awesome posts!

Happy Mother's Day!

Happy Mother's Day to any of my readers who are mothers!  Do you have any Mother's Day traditions?  My family always took Mom out to eat after church when I was a kid, and one such excursion turned out to be very memorable indeed, as we were involved in a pretty serious car accident on the way home.  That's always made me kind of have mixed feelings about the day -- none of us were seriously injured, but my mom got whiplash that has given her neck problems and headaches for the last twenty-some years.  It was a pretty scary experience for an eight-year-old, and ever since, I've liked staying home on Mother's Day more than going off to do something.

So this year, after church, we just stopped at a farmer's market on our way home.  We bought so many wonderful things!  Hearty apricot bread, wildflower honey, homemade kettle corn, beets, and pickles!  We came home and feasted on our finds.  Cowboy gave me a whole case of 24 glass bottles of Mexican Coca-Cola (made with real sugar, not corn syrup!), and my daughters gave me something they made in Sunday School this morning: a little mitchella plant in a pretty jar that they filled with colored sand and dirt.  My son told me "Happy Mother's Day!" accompanied by a hug :-)

My two gifts, plus some of our farmer's market haul

Now my hubby is also giving me some time to catch up on the computer.  Caffeine and computer time -- what could be better?  He's taking Dano out for a bike ride while the girls nap.  So I'd better start catching up on all the stuff I haven't read or written over the past week!  My best friend came to visit, and we had so much fun that I barely had a moment to check my email, much less blog.  So I have some movie reviews coming up (for Robert Downey, Jr.'s two Sherlock Holmes movies and for Iron Man 3), as soon as I can get them written.  

Meanwhile, enjoy your Sunday!

I got to hold Papoose today for the first time! Banana brought him over for a little birthday get-together at our place tonight, and I got to carry him around for quite a while. He'll be six weeks old tomorrow, and he's quite darling. I'm not all that fond of babies (human ones, I mean), but Papoose is a sweetie. He's got the Leatherneck's turned-up nose, big bright eyes, chubby little cheeks (now that he's gotten over the Yoda stage), and he's really into clinging onto his Aunt Hamlette's hair ;-) Just kidding--actually, he liked the collar of my shirt better.

We had lots of fun tonight. First Noumenon and Cowboy and I went to a spaghetti supper at the Ruralsburg Fire Dept, then we came back to our Crypt and El Padre, MamaRuth, Banana, and Papoose came over too. We had cake, which I'd baked yesterday, and ice cream. The cake turned out really well--it's a new recipe and made in a bundt pan, so I was a little nervous. You never know about new recipes, after all. And memories of the bundt pan fiasco at ED's a couple months ago made me widgety, even though I've never had one overflow like hers did (because I don't fill them up to the top). But every time I'd made anything in my bundt pan before (actually, it was my Grandma H's pan originally), when I'd flip it upside down, half the cake would stick to the pan and I'd have to scrape it out and stick it back together with frosting. So this time I made sure to grease the pan really well, and it came out perfectly! I didn't even frost it, I just dusted it with powdered sugar and it looked like something you'd buy at a bakery. It's probably the best-looking cake I've ever made! I should have taken a picture of it.

Anyway, we all sat around and talked and ate cake and ice cream and drank the Coke that Banana thoughtfully provided. El Padre gave me two Coke glasses to add to my ever-expanding collection. They're plastic, in that classic Coke glass design, with lids that look like bottle caps, and then plastic bendy straws. Very groovy.

The October picture in my Coca-Cola calendar contains a very creepy man. I'm thinking of putting a post-it note over his face. His eyes are not focused. His left eye is looking at the cherry-cheeked maiden standing next to him. But his right eye is looking far off to his right, as if he's pondering leaving said maiden, just hopping into their car and taking off without her, before she's even finished her bottle of soda. You'd think the person who painted this advertisement could have made him look less creepy, more happy with his Coke and his girl and his car.